


the locker room

by searchingforstars



Category: Iron Man (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe, Spider-Man (Tom Holland Movies)
Genre: Angst, Arguing, Crying, Gen, Hurt Peter Parker, Hurt/Comfort, Implied/Referenced Rape/Non-con, Mental Health Issues, Miscommunication, Misunderstandings, Non-Graphic Rape/Non-Con, Past Sexual Abuse, Peter Parker Needs a Hug, Peter Parker Whump, Peter Parker is a Mess, Tony Stark Has Issues
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-11-28
Updated: 2019-12-02
Packaged: 2021-02-26 04:54:26
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Rape/Non-Con
Chapters: 3
Words: 15,588
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21598006
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/searchingforstars/pseuds/searchingforstars
Summary: There are lots of things in the world that Peter Parker knows how to do.He knows how to make May smile when they’re behind on bills and she’s stressed beyond belief.He knows how to code an entire AI system from the ground up.He knows how to get Tony to sleep after workshop binges that last days, exactly which movie and which position curled up on the couch will make the process as quick as possible.This is just another one of those thingsPeter knows what to do. He’s done this before.He closes his eyes. Wishes he was somewhere else. Waits for it to be over.--or, Peter's falling apart and he doesn't know how things will ever go back to normal again after Ryder.
Relationships: May Parker (Spider-Man) & Peter Parker, Pepper Potts/Tony Stark, Peter Parker & Tony Stark
Comments: 63
Kudos: 733





	1. everything is fine

**Author's Note:**

> this work contains rape/non-con themes. none of it is explicitly graphic but still please be careful and take care of yourselves x

Pain is throbbing slow and steady in Peter’s wrist as he wakes up, and it has him rolling over to shove his face into the pillow with a muffled groan.

He dares to crack open his eyelids slightly, but immediately screws them closed again not even a second later once the sunlight filtering through the gaps in his drawn curtains hits his eyes. 

Confusion muddles his already sleep-addled mind because this definitely isn’t Queens. The light is coming from the left, and his window is meant to be to the right of his bed. He can’t feel any mattress springs underneath him either, which should have been the biggest give-away right from the start, honestly. 

The tower, then. 

He’s just working up to opening his eyes again, properly this time, to face the early morning sunlight and confirm his theory, and figure out how the hell he got here when he can’t remember anything of the night before or why the hell his wrist is giving him so much damn grief. 

He doesn’t need to though, because before he can, he hears the sound of a door click open and a voice filling the room. It’s light and sarcastic; so completely and undeniably Tony.

“Oh, there he is. Morning, sunshine.”

Peter twists around to see the man leaning up against the doorframe. His posture looks relaxed enough, but he’s studying Peter carefully and with clear concern as he continues. “FRIDAY said you were awake, I thought I’d come see how your wrist is holding up. Any pain?”

Peter briefly considers lying but decides that there’s no point. Tony knows him well enough to be able to see right through him.

He nods.

“Only, like, a tiny bit though,” he glances down at his wrist and sees it wrapped in a sterile-looking compression bandage, which probably explains the throbbing, but he definitely doesn’t remember it being there last time he checked. Then again, he doesn’t remember much of anything that came after him swinging off the top of his and May’s apartment complex sometime yesterday afternoon. 

“I, um, what happened? I don’t remember,” he asks hesitantly, pushing himself up against the pillows with his good arm as Tony walks further into the room. He shoves a discarded hoodie aside to make room for himself to settle down the end of the bed. 

“Yeah, Bruce thought this might happen. One of the goddamn wizards blasted you as you fell, and it caught you in the temple. No concussion or anything, though, your wrist was the worst of it. It’s only a sprain, a pretty nasty one, at that, but still, just a sprain. You tried to catch yourself but it didn’t quite work.” 

None of this is making much sense. Fell? Fell where?

He prays it wasn’t just when he left Queens. He’s leapt from that building hundreds of times, so to have that happen would be _so_ freaking embarrassing. 

“We need to back up here. How? When?”

“Okay, one thing at a time. We can do that. When? Yesterday.” Tony answers, before raising his eyebrows at him, “wait, you actually don’t remember anything? At all? As in not even the literal _portal_ that opened on Fifth Ave or the invasion of sorcerers that came out of it?” 

Peter shakes his head. He kind of wishes he _could_ remember it. It sounds pretty epic. Way less lame than a tumble from his apartment building. 

“They had a bone to pick with Strange, apparently. I always knew that the wizard was bad news,” Tony grumbles. “One second you were fine and then you were on the ground. Gave me a hell of a scare, kid. We’re not entirely sure what happened but there was a lot going on, I think your senses just got a bit overwhelmed and you freaked a little. Whatever it was, you missed the building with your webs. Lucky you weren’t far off the ground because I doubt the street cleaners fancied scraping a spider-pancake off the sidewalk.” 

A blush rises on Peter’s face and he buries his face back into his pillow. “I’m sorry,” he mumbles.

“Not your fault, Pete. If anything, it’s mine.” He pauses. “I don’t know what I was thinking, letting you out there without proper training.”

A tiny spark of indignation inside of Peter is enough to have him looking up again to meet Tony’s eyes. He hasn’t spent _months_ convincing Tony to let him accompany the team on their missions just to be told that he hasn’t had enough training. He’s been sparring with Natasha and Steve ever since they all found out about his identity, he’s more than ready _thank you very much_. Tony just worries. 

“That’s not true. I train with Steve and Nat, I have been for ages.” 

“I just don’t know if that’s gonna cut it anymore, Pete,” Tony says before sighing, softening his tone. “We can talk about this later, okay? Once you’re out of bed and preferably showered because Bruce and I tried to deal with you while you were unconscious as best as we could but we drew the line there. You kinda smell.” 

No matter that Peter is still a little peeved, he knows Tony isn’t wrong now that he thinks about it. He feels grimy, the layer of residual sweat from the Spider-Man suit still coating his skin 

“Okay, fine," Peter cedes. He holds his wrist up for inspection. “Is the bandage alright for the shower?”

“Yeah, yeah. Bruce gave you a waterproof one, obviously. What sort of second-class institution do you think this is?” 

* * *

Tony glances up from where he’s sitting when Peter makes his way into the living room a short while later, hair curling damply on top of his head from the shower. 

The image of a limp and motionless Peter cradled in his arms is seared into the front of his mind, so it soothes Tony to see him looking so fresh and awake, up and moving around again. Even so, the white bandage still stands out against his arm though and the guilt throbs once more, just to remind Tony that this is _his fault_. 

Peter is his to look out for. There have never been any questions around that, it’s a cold, hard, indisputable fact. He failed last night, but he can fix it. 

“You feel any better?” he asks. 

Peter nods as he goes to pour himself a cup of coffee that Tony’s brewed and left sitting on the kitchen island.

Usually, he might chastise the kid for this, spurred on by the voice in the back of his head reminding him that the last thing he wants is for Peter to pick up _any_ of his bad habits as a result of the increasing amount of time he seems to be spending at the tower. He figures that Peter’s probably earned it this morning, though, so he keeps his mouth shut and waits for him to shuffle back over and perch on the couch. Peter offers him a tentative smile as he does, but it’s nervous and Tony reaches out to squeeze his knee in what he hopes is a reassuring gesture.

“Is the pain better or worse?”

Peter looks a little exasperated. “Honestly, Mister Stark, I feel fine. I’ve been _stabbed_ before,” Tony winces, “this is nothing. You literally have nothing to worry about, it was just an accident. Accidents are always bound to happen, right? Nothing we can do about it.” 

Tony frowns again. Accidents are meant to be avoided whenever possible. Accidents _need_ to be avoided when it comes to Peter, no ifs or buts about it. 

“Pete…” 

Peter narrows his eyes at the way Tony trails off. “You can’t kick me off the team,” he blurts suddenly, “it was nothing. So what, maybe there were a couple too many wizards or whatever you said, and my senses went crazy. I can control it, usually. You’ve just started letting me come with you guys, Mister Stark, you can’t get rid of me because of this!”

“Hey, hey, hey,” Tony holds his hands up placatingly. “No one’s getting rid of you, cool it a little. I just think that maybe we need to take a step back, we’ve jumped into the deep-end a little too soon. You’re just not quite prepared for this sort of high-action stuff. Don’t get me wrong, you’ve got the skills but we’re talking the big-time stuff here. It’s a lot to handle, I understand why your senses get overwhelmed when there’s so much input and adrenaline but if you’re gonna be right there alongside us, I need to trust that you’re safe. I’ll settle for absolutely nothing less than you being safe one hundred per cent of the time.”

“You can train me then,” Peter says, knowing full well that Tony will turn this down in a nanosecond. He’s always flat-out refused to spar with Peter while in the suit, seemingly irrationally afraid of hurting the boy. 

“Nope. Not happening, you know that, kid. None of us really understand the exact ins and outs of your enhancements, you need something a little more specialised.”

“Steve’s enhanced. He trains me.”

Tony sighs. “That’s different, he’s straight out of a bottle. There’s research around that, we know how he works. We haven’t got any of that for you. We don’t have much intel into however fuck Oscorp engineered those radioactive spiders and I sure as hell don’t fancy sticking my nose into Norman’s business to find out.”

“I know a guy,” Tony continues, then reconsiders. “Well, more like Fury knows a guy. But I’ve met him a few times. Ryder Elliot, he’s worked with all sorts of enhancements. He’s got something funky going on with his DNA as well, not entirely sure what though. He’s strong, he’ll be a good match for you. He used to do a bit of work down at Xavier’s School for Gifted Youngsters. Comes with very high praise. I actually tried to get him on board to work with Wanda after the whole accords fiasco but Barton got a bit prickly about that, he was pretty adamant about dealing with everything himself so not much I could do. I think that this might be the best thing to do to really help you figure out how to hone your strengths.”

Tony's been thinking about this since the second he got to the MedBay last night to remain by an unconscious Peter's side while he was patched up. He knows that none of them are really up to the task of honing Peter's enhancements, not to the level that they would need to be for Tony to feel settled about Peter being back out in the middle of the battle fray with them.

There’s a lull in the conversation for a few seconds, and Tony knows that he’s won this particular battle. Not that it's ever an especially fantastic feeling.

Coming out on top of disagreements with Peter has never, not once, felt rewarding. The resigned look on the kids face is just a touch too close to reminding him of his own childhood, but he pushes that aside firmly. This is for the good of the team, the best thing for Peter, and he _knows_ that.

“I don’t know, Mister Stark,” Peter says eventually. The resistance has all but faded from his voice, replaced with the kind of nervous apprehension that immediately and instinctively makes Tony want to back down and shield Peter from anything that makes him the slightest bit uncomfortable.

He won’t grow and learn like that, though. 

This is necessary. 

“You train with him for a bit, then when he says you’re ready, I’ll clear you for Avengers-level stuff again, okay? These are my conditions. I’ll never be able to live with myself if I let anything happen to you. Plus, May would _castrate_ me.”

Peter’s shoulders slump further. He knows that he’s beat. He loves patrolling, he does; New York is his home and keeping it safe is great. But there’s something about being able to fight alongside Tony, Steve, Natasha and the rest of the team that has always lit a fire inside of him, made the scrawny little boy he’s tried to shove away deep inside of him proud. 

“You’ll love him, Pete. I promise.”

* * *

As it turns out, Peter doesn’t love Ryder. Not in the slightest.

He doesn’t even particularly like him, to be honest. 

He gives him a chance, though, because that’s what May has always taught him to do.

The message is relayed to him by FRIDAY, on Wednesday afternoon, only a few days after their mission gone wrong. Almost as soon as he’s got the final all clear on his wrist from Bruce, completely healed and back to normal - courtesy of his unnaturally accelerated healing, he’s being instructed to meet Tony in the training gym up on the sixtieth floor. 

He knows what’s coming, he’s not stupid, but he’s still slightly cautious as he steps out of the elevator to see Tony standing in the middle of the room conversing with another man. 

There’s no one else it could be apart from this Ryder guy he’d had mentioned to him, and he might surprised at how quickly Tony has organised the whole thing if he hadn't learnt to accept that when you have a wealth of riches at your fingertips like Tony does, you can make whatever you want happen whenever you want it. 

“There he is. Peter!” Tony calls out when he spots him, waving him over and Peter makes his way to the centre of the room. 

The man Tony is standing with must be in his early thirties, Peter guesses. He’s got dark hair slicked back from his forehead, scratchings of stubble across his jaw and the kind of arm muscles that Peter could only ever dream of having, even _with_ his enhanced strength. 

It’s hard not to feel just the least bit intimidated.

“Ryder, this is Spider-Man, Peter Parker,” Tony introduces, and Peter takes the proffered hand tentatively, “Peter, this is Ryder Elliot.”

‘Nice to meet you, Peter. I’m looking forward to getting started.” 

Peter gives him what he hopes is a friendly smile, but judging from the odd side-eye that Tony gives him, maybe it came across as more of a grimace. He tries to force his mouth into action for the first time since stepping into the room. “I, um, yeah, hi. Nice to meet you too,” he stumbles. 

He tries his best to relax around people he doesn’t know, and being enveloped into the world of Tony Stark has helped him shake even some of his most persistent insecurities but the social anxiety that plagued his childhood still clings to his most vulnerable moments 

Ryder just smiles sympathetically. It doesn’t quite reach his eyes, but maybe that’s just Peter’s imagination. Or maybe the man is a bit nervous like he is, but somehow he doubts that. 

Ryder turns to shake Tony’s hand again. “Thanks for showing me around, Stark. I assure you, Spider-Man is in good hands.”

Tony nods. “No worries. I’ll leave you two to it then.” He glances over towards Peter at this, eyes questioning in a way that only the two of them can understand. 

_Are you going to be okay if I leave?_

Peter nods determinedly. 

Tony gives him a small smile in response, before turning on his heel. “I’ll meet you back upstairs once you’re finished then, Pete. Oh, and Ryder, if you need anything just ask FRIDAY. She’s everywhere in here, apart from the locker rooms, she’ll be able to help you out.” 

Ryder nods, taking note.

“I’m sure we’ll be just fine.”

* * *

Nothing is distinctly _off_ at first, at least for the first few weeks. 

He spends two afternoons a week down in the gym, and it’s all pretty much exactly as Peter expected. They train. He has Peter working on his webbing techniques on the ceiling course that had been installed without mention once Peter became a more permanent team fixture, as well as testing how much input he can handle, how many obstacles he can deal with at once without becoming overwhelmed. 

It’s nothing too out of the ordinary. Sure, maybe the sparring and hand to hand combat is a little rougher than he’s used to with Steve and Nat, sure, but he assumes this must be what Tony wants for him. He does need to toughen up to actually be a useful member of the team, after all. 

At the beginning of the third week, Peter lets his guard down, just a little bit.

No sooner than he can do that though, things take a turn. 

It’s not anything major. Ruder just starts getting a little, well - _handsy_ , for lack of a better word. Peter isn’t quite sure how to describe it. He hopes that maybe it’s all just a figment of his paranoid imagination.

He’ll offer him a hand up after Peter has been slammed down onto the gym mats time after time and squeeze just a bit too tight, or pat him on the back at the end of a particularly vigorous session, hand lowering down just a little too far and lingering just a little too long.

It’s nothing to be getting worked up over, really, Peter tries to reason with himself. It’s so subtle that he could probably just pass it off as nothing if he wasn’t he so averse to touches like these. He’s never been a fan of being touched by people he doesn’t know. 

Not since he was nine years old, anyway. 

After this, Peter yanks his walls back up again in hopes that he can shelter behind them. He knows that’s not how it works but he irrationally lets himself cling to the hope anyway.

Deep down, he knows that whatever men like Ryder want, they get it.

* * *

Peter is sweaty and boneless as he shoves the door open to the locker room. The tile is blissfully cool under his bare feet as he makes to grab his backpack from where it’s hanging on one of the hooks next to the lockers. 

He just wants to grab his bag and get out of here. He’s in desperate need of a shower when he gets back up to his room. Usually, his stuff would be up there waiting for him but he was running late from school today after being held back by his Spanish teacher who only wanted to bemoan him about his most recent lackluster quiz grade (which totally isn’t his fault, the quiz was the day after he had literally been knocked unconscious by _wizards_ and these are the moments when he hates the whole secret identity thing because he really thinks he deserves a break). So instead, with no time for a pit stop up at the penthouse, he had to settle for leaving his things in here today.

His entire being is so exhausted after the amount of hand to hand combat training that he’s been subjected to over the past hour and a half that his senses don’t even warn him to the figure - Ryder, he quickly realises - approaching behind him and wrapping arms around his middle.

The hold is tight, uncomfortably so, and it doesn’t relent when Peter tries to squirm away, suddenly extremely uneasy. 

“Whoa, chill out there, Parker. Just wanted to tell you what a great job you did today. You really are strong for a little young thing, huh?” 

There’s a chin on his shoulder. Hot breath on the side of his neck.

Peter doesn’t know what to say. Even if he did, he’s not sure he would be able to get it out around the rapidly forming lump in his throat, blocking his airways and halting any and all of the violent protests to the sudden contact desperately rising up inside of him.

He dares to shove back a little bit harder this time, his shoulder hitting against Ryder’s. Just enough to let the man know that he really is _not_ enjoying this. There's just a chuckle in response, deep and dark sounding. 

Peter _hates_ it, hates all of it. He wants to leave, wants to be in the penthouse where he’s safe and no one will touch him if he doesn't want them to. 

Ryder lets him go after a couple more agonizingly long seconds, and Peter stumbles back quickly, yanking his backpack off the hook that he had been reaching for and hugging it to his chest like a shield. 

He feels small. 

Ryder studies him carefully, before nodding at him sincerely as if nothing out of the ordinary has just happened. “I’ll see you on Wednesday. Keep working on those left hooks, they’re still a little sloppy.”

Peter remains frozen until the man walks out the locker room doors, listening out for the heavy footsteps on wooden floors echoing through the empty gym and the sound of the elevator doors sliding shut smoothly. It’s only then that he feels safe enough to peer out and slowly make his way over to the elevator himself. 

He wants Mister Stark. 

  
  


He tries his best to regain as much of his composure as he can manage in the ride up in the elevator. He knows he can’t tell Mister Stark. The locker room was nothing out of the ordinary, probably. Looking back at it, maybe Ryder was just genuinely being friendly, and Peter just froze up like a pathetic, scared child. 

He’ll never prove to Ryder that he’s worthy of being a part of the Avengers if he keeps this act up. And then Ryder will tell Tony how skittish and weak he is and that will be the end of Spider-Man's involvement with the Avenger's.

Tony _can't_ know.

He has to keep his cool.

So when he steps out into the penthouse, he makes sure to let his arms dangle loosely at his sides, his backpack almost brushing the floor instead of being clutched to his chest protectively where he wants it. 

The only person in the room is Pepper, apparently home from work early and curled up on the sofa. The news is playing on the TV but all of her attention is focused on the StarkPad in front of her and Peter figures that with being a CEO as well as trying to manage Tony in both a professional and intimate capacity, the work probably never really stops.

She hears his footsteps, though, and cranes her head around over the back of the couch until she catches sight of him. “Oh, Peter, hi,” she smiles at him, so soft and genuine that Peter almost shudders with the weight of his relief. 

_Safe._

Pepper glances at him up and down when he doesn't say anything. “You look a little pale, is everything okay?”

Concern softens in her eyes and it almost makes Peter want to burst into tears. Which is _stupid_ , obviously, because nothing happened and he’s just being overdramatic. 

“Yeah... Just, um, y'know, been working out.” 

_Real smooth, Parker._

She studies him for a second before apparently accepting his answer and letting it go, changing the subject. “Is May working late tonight?”

“I think she said she’d be home by nine, so not too late.”

“Stay for dinner, then,” she pushes gently. Neither Pepper or Tony ever ask Peter anymore, instead just straight up telling him that he should stay if he wants to. It didn’t take them long to cotton on to the fact that Peter has a habit of turning things down when people offer them out of guilt. He appreciates it. It makes him feel like he’s welcome, that he’s wanted. 

“Tony’s just in the kitchen, I somehow coerced him into cooking. I’m pretty sure there should be stir fry going if that’s okay with you. At least that’s the ingredients I ordered in anyway, but who knows with him. I’ll be in once I’ve finished up these last few things for the day,” she informs him, gesturing vaguely down towards whatever is on the screen in front of her. 

Peter thanks her and dumps his bag behind the sofa before seeking out Tony, who is indeed in the kitchen. The scent of ginger and soy sauce is wafting through the air and Peter’s stomach rumbles. 

At the sound of the footsteps, Tony turns from where he’s standing in front of the stove. “Hey, Pete, just the person I wanted to see.” At closer inspection, he’s moving broccoli, carrot and onion around in a pan with a wooden spoon, but he takes his eyes off it for a few seconds in favour of grinning at Peter. “Reckon you could stir the veggies for a bit while I chop up the chicken? Turns out my superior multi-tasking skills don’t exactly extend to the kitchen,” he quips.

He glances over again when he doesn’t get a reply and clearly he sees the same lost expression on Peter’s face that Pepper had spotted, because he’s quick to motion Peter closer to him with a few cursory hand movements and pulls him into his side in a hug as soon as he’s within reach. 

“Hey, buddy, what’s up?”

Peter shrugs silently. He doesn’t want to talk about it. 

“Did everything with Ryder go alright today?” Tony probes gently. Peter shrugs again, but when Tony doesn't budge, remaining silent, he realises he’s waiting for an actual answer. 

“Yeah, it was fine. Ryder, he’s just, I don’t know, a little bit, uh...” he trails off, not sure how to voice his fears to Tony without sounding paranoid and whiny. He ends up sounding whiny anyway. “Are you _sure_ you guys can’t just help me out? I’ll work super hard, I promise.”

“We talked about this Peter,” Tony sighs, and he sounds so genuinely regretful that Peter wishes he hadn’t ever brought it up in the first place. “It’s only until Ryder says you’re ready for this level of combat.”

Peter nods and accepts his fate. He doesn’t question it again. Tony always does everything with his best interests at heart, Peter knows that. He knows what’s best.

So he takes over from Tony and moves the vegetables around the sizzling pan with the wooden spoon absentmindedly until Pepper steps into the kitchen and pronounces them done. Peter hasn’t been paying all that much attention and Tony scolds him gently for being distracted, accusing him of trying to sabotage his cooking.

Pepper fires back in Peter’s defence that Tony had been sabotaging his own cooking just by _stepping into the kitchen._

She’s joking, and Tony’s hand flies up over his heart in mock offence. 

Peter forces a small smile and a half-hearted chuckle and ignores the concerned glance Pepper throws him. 

He sits at the table across from Tony and eats his chicken stir fry. He tries to pretend that everything is fine. 

Because it is. He’s just overreacting.

Everything is _fine_. 

* * *

It all cools off for a while. Peter doesn’t set foot in the locker room and Ryder doesn’t touch him any more than strictly necessary. It leaves Peter reeling, wondering whether he _did_ just make it all up, conjure up his worst nightmare out of a feverish mix of paranoia and dread.

The waiting game is worse though. 

He almost wishes he told Tony that first night in the kitchen when the words were on the tip of his tongue and he knew Tony could just make it all go away if he wasn’t so scared of looking weak and defenceless. That’s the exact opposite of what he wants Tony to see him as when he’s trying to convince the man that he _is_ worthy of the Avengers.

So Peter still doesn’t say anything. 

It’s nothing he can’t handle, even if he does feel like he’s constantly on edge around Ryder, his entire being tense and rigid, ready to slip into defence mode at the slightest wrong touch. 

Ryder is circling him, playing with him like prey. Waiting for the right moment to strike.

As much as he would like to, Peter can’t avoid the locker room, hidden behind the heavy double-doors right at the back of the gym, forever. 

Tony and Pepper are hosting foreign investors in the penthouse tonight, and as little as Peter actually knows about the business side of Stark Industries, he's sure that a sweaty and unruly looking teenage boy traipsing through the apartment in the middle of it would _not_ be all that impressive or welcomed.

This does pose the problem, though, of how exactly he makes himself look half presentable and avoid Happy complaining if he stinks out his car with sweat when he drives him back to Queens later tonight.

He half considers stopping by Steve’s floor to see if the man would let him use his shower, but he disregards that idea pretty quickly out of fear that it might look weird, or make someone suspect something is going on when it definitely _isn’t_.

Well, at least there isn’t until Peter has decided that his only option is throwing himself in the shower here before heading out to find Happy. He’s sure that he heard Ryder take the elevator a few minutes ago and the coast is clear, so he pulls his sweat-soaked shirt over his head and rummages through his backpack for the hoodie he’d had on at school earlier today. 

He’s just curled his fingers around the soft and crumpled fabric, shoved down underneath his chemistry textbook, when the back of his neck flares with sudden, sharp pain. Before Peter even has time to get himself into anything resembling a defensive stance or whip around to locate the threat, hands are grabbing at him from behind and he’s being shoved up against the frigid tile.

It doesn’t matter that he didn’t manage to lay eyes on the intruder. He knows exactly who it is, anyways. Sure enough, Ryder’s voice rumbles low next to his ear, making desperation flood his veins, red and hot.

“Today’s session isn’t quite over, Peter.”

He’s held in place by one of Ryder’s hands wrapped around his upper arm, holding him in place as if he’s an animal at risk of bolting. 

Maybe he is.

“Ryder, w-what? What are you d-doing?”

He’s ignored. Ryder’s free hand continues to roam his body, leaving a trail of dirtiness wherever it goes. The closeness of a body pressed right up against his own is making him feel claustrophobic. He’s trapped, just like he was underneath Skip behind his locked bedroom door so many years ago. He’s a scrawny kid again, an inhaler purposefully hidden from his view and his glasses far out of his reach. Skip liked it when he was vulnerable. 

This is all too familiar. 

“You’re such a pretty boy, Peter.” 

He wants to struggle and lash out, he should be able to fight this. Ryder’s enhanced, but he surely can’t be that much stronger than Peter is. He could have the guy on the floor if he really tried hard enough, but suddenly there are hands creeping upwards, getting _far_ too close to his inner thighs and all the fight leaves his body, replaced by a panic which binds his limbs with fear. 

“No, no, n-no, R-Ryder, please, _please_ … you can’t do th-this.”

He pulls back weakly, breathing laboured and getting caught in his lousy lungs. His vision swims in front of him, and maybe there are tears in his eyes but he can’t be sure. 

There are lips on his neck, open-mouthed kisses, wet and hot. 

“Please, n-no, I don’t want it,” he begs, but it falls on deaf ears. 

Ryder just laughs, fake and condescending. “Oh, Peter. We can just consider this part of your training. Stark told me that he wanted you totally ready for all aspects of combat operations. I'm sure everyone must be concerned about kidnapping, with such a cute one like you. If you were held hostage, I’m sure no one in their right mind with this little body all to themselves would ever be able to resist doing the most _nasty_ things. I'm just preparing you.” 

His pants are tugged down his legs. 

There are lots of things in the world that Peter Parker knows how to do.

He knows how to make May smile when they’re behind on bills and she’s stressed beyond belief.

He knows how to get to the tower from Queens like the back of his hand, the quickest webbed route becoming muscle memory. 

He knows how to code an entire AI system from the ground up. 

He knows how to get Tony to sleep after workshop binges that last days, exactly which movie and which position curled up on the couch will make the process as quick as possible. 

This is just another one of those things

Peter knows what to do. He’s done this before.

He closes his eyes. Wishes he was somewhere else. Waits for it to be over. 


	2. too broken, too bruised

After the first time, it becomes relentless.

Ryder knocks him to the ground time after time during their ‘training’ sessions because Peter is too frozen with fear to even fight back against him during their hand to hand combat work now. Ryder offers him a hand up. Ryder leads him towards the locker rooms at the end of the afternoon. 

Peter can’t stop it. He knows that much. 

“Remember that this is just part of your training, Peter. Stark won’t let you out as Spider-Man with them anymore unless I clear you for it. You’re gonna stay quiet, aren’t you, my good boy?” Ryder whispers in his ear one afternoon. 

Peter’s eyes are blown wide with fear but he nods frantically. “Yes, y-yes, I promise.”

Ryder makes a soft cooing noise of praise at this. There’s already acidic bile curdling in Peter’s stomach, and the sound makes him want to expel it all over the floor. He can only imagine the kind of trouble he’ll be in if he does. 

“I knew you would. Besides, even if you do tell, I’ll let everyone know that you wanted it, just how much you’re enjoying this.” Peter whimpers. He’s never enjoyed anything less in his life. He kind of wishes he could escape his body just so the touches would _stop_. “You’re dirty, Peter, and no one will want a dirty little boy who spreads their legs for just anyone on the team now, will they?” 

Peter remains silent, eyes screwed shut to try and stop the tears from falling down his cheeks. Ryder pinches the sensitive skin on his inner thighs and Peter jerks back abruptly. 

“I said, _will they_?” Ryder repeats, voice dangerous. 

Peter shakes his head desperately. “No, they w-won’t.”

Ryder is satisfied. The pain intensifies. 

* * *

Peter is trying his hardest to keep the pieces of his broken and battered body from falling apart, but he’s not sure he’s doing a very good job. 

Vile whispered words and groping touches infect his dreams, then they come to life in the form of _Ryder_ , tearing at his sanity and pulling him apart just that little bit further every few days

It seems never-ending. 

He hears Tony outside sometimes, voice echoing around the gym. He asks after Peter, about how everything is going. Ryder always tells him the same thing.

“I just don’t think he’s quite ready. He’s doing marvellously for me, he’s such a _talented_ kid but I would never want to risk sending him out into the field and him getting hurt, y’know? We just need a little more time together.”

Peter always hears Tony hum in agreement and take it all at face value. He never questions it.

Peter wishes he would just _ask_. Ask why everything is taking so long, why his strength seems to be going backwards rather than forwards. Ask why he isn’t the same kid anymore.

He doesn’t think he ever will be again. 

Tony doesn’t ask. 

It continues.

* * *

“Hey, Pete? Could you pass me the soldering iron real quick?”

Peter jerks his head up from where he’s been compulsively tracing shapes into the top of the workbench. The circuit board he’s meant to be fiddling with the voltage regulation of is abandoned in front of him. 

He knows that he's wasting Tony's time, just by being here. He really shouldn't be. He's in no fit shape to be allowed near any of Tony's expensive equipment but May's working well into the evening tonight and Ryder was so rough and unforgiving with him this afternoon that the thought of going home to sit in their cold and empty apartment was too much to handle. So he gave in to his most basic human instincts, the longing for protection, closeness, human connection, and ended up here. 

Tony finally pulls his attention away from his own work when Peter doesn't answer his question, or even simply move to grab the soldering iron sitting to his right to pass over like he requested. When Peter sees his eyes on him, he knows that Tony will realise that he hasn't touched any of the work that's been set out for him at all. 

Tony doesn't mention it though; doesn't rib Peter for having his head stuck in the clouds, or slacking off from their work. 

It's not exactly surprising.

Tony’s been walking on eggshells around him recently, and Peter hates that he’s made people worry. He’s been trying to avoid that as much as possible, but the smiles are getting harder to force and he's left jumpy, hesitant, nervous with the little voice in the back of his head constantly telling him that no one is safe. Maybe they're not. Maybe the Avenger’s know what’s been going on for the past month or so, maybe they just don’t care. Maybe they’re waiting for Ryder to get sick of Peter, to decide that he’s too broken and too bruised to bother with anymore, so that they can boot him from the team as soon as Ryder's done with him. 

On his better days, when he regains a sliver of control over his rational thoughts, he tries to tell himself that there’s no way this can be the case. He doesn’t think Tony has ever been as gentle with him as he has been recently, this cautious and open and welcoming. As if he knows he needs a space where he can feel protected, free from any danger.

He hopes that’s here. The little voice is still there though.

 _No one is_ _safe_.

That’s why when Tony gets up from his work station and lays a hand as gently as he can on the nape of Peter’s neck to try and bring him back to himself, Peter flinches back violently, the stool he’s sitting on scraping against the floor with a metallic screech as he does.

Tony winces. 

He doesn’t freak out or show too much outward emotion, though. Instead, he just remains cool and collected. His hand hovers awkwardly in mid-air between himself and Peter for a second before he draws it back to his side slowly. 

“Peter? Pete? Everything okay over here?”

Peter sucks in a deep breath and forces himself to raise his eyes to meet Tony’s. They’re soft and there’s nothing but worry swimming in them. Nothing like Ryder’s dark, predatory eyes, stalking Peter whenever he’s in the vicinity. 

He tries to get words out but they get stuck around the lump in his throat. A whine escapes instead.

“I know something’s going on, bud. All you need to do is say the words and let me know what’s going on and we can figure it out together, okay?”

It’s _so_ tempting. 

He wants to lean right into Tony, let him take care of him, let him draw all of the infection and _dirtiness_ out of the festering open wound inside of him. He needs one question answered though, so caught up in his own head and petrified, mind still stuck in the locker room. He needs to feel safe. 

He _knows_ Tony would never do that.

But then again, the nine-year-old Peter who sat on his bedroom floor and read comic books and played Uno and Connect Four with Skip could have never anticipated or been prepared for the pain that he would have to endure. He never thought Skip would turn on him that way. 

He needs to hear it out loud, his paranoia laced mind needing confirmation that Tony won’t be the same.

So he asks. Just to make sure.

“Mister Stark, you wouldn’t, uh, you would never, y’know, um, touch me?”

Everything in the room stills. Tony stares at him. His forehead is creased ever so slightly in the way that it always does when he’s trying to figure something out. 

“Touch you?” Tony repeats slowly, eventually. His eyes bore into Peter scrutinisingly.

It takes a second for everything to click into place with Tony until realisation suddenly flashes across the man’s face and Peter thinks maybe this is it. He’s just opened his mouth and let his biggest fears escape. Maybe Tony might finally realise what’s been going on, maybe Peter might finally get the safety that he’s so desperately craving. 

But then, Tony _explodes_.

“ _What_?” he spits out, taking a step back, further away from Peter and no, no, no, this is _not_ what he wanted at all. He’s aching for comfort, for soft touches that heal rather than hurt but now he’s fucked that all up because Tony is moving further away and the distance is tearing Peter apart.

“Is that what's been wrong with you recently? You’re worried that I invite you into my home, into my _life_ , just so I can get my fix of preying on innocent children? What the _fuck_ , Peter?”

He’s too caught up in his own rage to notice the way Peter trembles and pushes himself further back against his workbench. Tony’s voice is too loud and his movements are too sudden and Peter hates himself for thinking of Ryder and the way he has the same ability to shrink Peter down and make him feel insignificant, worthless, a fuck up.

“No, n-no, that’s not-”

Tony doesn’t listen. He barges on.

“I know my track history isn’t exactly stellar, the press likes to think I’d fuck anything with two legs but I’m not a paedophile, _Jesus_.” His voice is low and hard, masking the hurt that Peter would be able to see so clearly in his eyes if his own weren’t rapidly filling with tears.

 _Pathetic_.

“Mister Stark, I d-don’t think that, I p-promise, I just wanted, I mean I _needed_ to make sure that-

“ _What_? What did you need to make sure of?”

“I'm sorry, n-no, M-Mister Stark-”

“That’s not what I asked. What are you worried about, Peter? That you need to make sure you’re _safe_ around me?”

Peter wants to open his mouth to rebut Tony’s biting comment, but he can’t. That’s exactly it. He _does_ want to make sure he's safe around Tony, but not because the man himself has given Peter any reason not to trust him. No. Only because the others have given Peter a reason to be wary, reasons to back away from male dominance, the slightest display of aggression or depraved affection.

Ryder has _ruined_ him. 

He knows that now, and he’s not sure how he’ll ever go back to being able to live life without fear that someone will be hiding just around the corner waiting to defile him without warning. That kind of life seems like an entirely impossible fantasy he conjures up in his head to escape the pain but he so _badly_ wants it. He can’t have it though. Ryder is ingraining that into him, if nothing else. Trust no one, no matter how badly ever fibre in his being _knows_ that Tony is safe, that Tony would never _ever_ , in a million years, hurt him. Trust no one. 

Peter’s silence sits heavy in the air. 

The longer it persists, the more Tony’s mask of aggression recedes back into hurt before he eventually steels himself. Closes himself off to Peter and turns slightly to face his own workstation. 

There’s a sense of finality to it.

Peter didn’t mean for this to happen, he really, _really_ didn’t. He just wanted reassurance, to finally be able to fully settle into Tony’s side without that tiny voice in the back of his mind telling him that he needs to be on full alert at all times in case a hand creeps down his lower back or the front of his pants without warning. He needs to be prepared. 

“I-I, I’m sorry, I didn’t mean-”

Peter hates how plaintive he sounds. He’s desperately trying to make eye-contact with Tony through his tear-filled eyes, but even with the blurry vision he can see Tony pointedly looking anywhere but where he’s pressed up against the bench.

Peter thinks he can see his hands shaking. If he would turn around and actually look at Peter, maybe he’d realise that his are shaking as well. 

“I need you to leave, Peter. I can’t be around you right now," he snaps. "I highly doubt you want to be around me much either. God forbid I try to crawl into your bed at night or whatever the absolute _fuck_ you seem to be thinking.”

The words dig their claws into the tightness in his chest. They rip and tear and pull Peter apart but Tony isn’t even looking at him, he can’t see how Peter is falling apart only mere metres from him. 

“Mister Stark, _p-please_.”

He just needs Tony to look at him. He just needs Tony to _understand_.

But he doesn’t.

“Leave, Peter.”

His tone leaves absolutely no room for argument or contesting. It’s sharp and harsh in a way that Peter has never heard directed towards him before. He doesn’t want to leave. He really doesn’t, but he doesn’t have a choice.

Tony’s back is rigidly turned to him now as he stands, nearly pitching forward on his quivering legs. He gathers his bag up in his arms and follows the orders, leaving the room just like he's been instructed to. Tony doesn't glance at him as he goes, not once.

He leaves the building without informing Happy. He doesn’t exactly feel like trying to explain away his trembling hands or the way that tear tracks have left stains on the blotchy skin of his cheeks. He catches the subway home and stands the entire way, gripping onto the handrail and swaying with the movement of the train carriage. It hurts too much to sit down again. 

No one gives the distressed, limping teenage boy a second glance. 

It is New York City, after all. 

* * *

Peter doesn’t get out of bed the next day. He just stares at his ceiling. There are chips in the paint, a result of hastily ripped off sticky tack. He’d had glow stars stuck to his ceiling for years, but he pulled them all off in a rush when a bunch of kids he was doing a group project with in middle school saw them one afternoon and mocked him relentlessly for them. Right now, he’s sort of regretting that hasty decision. 

He counts the chipped marks instead.

One...two...three...four...five...six...seven...eight…

He loses count. 

He starts again. 

And again. And again. And again. 

Somewhere deep down inside of him, as he lies there, motionless and emotionless, he’s clinging to the hope that maybe Tony might text him, give Peter a chance to explain, ask to see him, even despite how horrifically wrong their last interaction went. It’s Peter’s fault anyway, he _knows_ this. 

Tony doesn’t want to see him. Peter doesn’t blame him. 

His phone fills the room with its silence, a confirmation of this fact. It lies on his nightstand, untouched. 

Having hope is a childish thing to do in the first place. All hope does is allow you to imagine things that will never be and then make the subsequent crash back into reality an increasingly bitter one. 

He should probably feel guilty right about now, anyway. 

Sunday’s are May’s day off and they usually make an effort to do something. They used to go see whatever was showing at the local cinema in the afternoons until the ticket prices were put up. Now, sometimes they'll go for a wander through Forest Park, maybe thrift shopping if the seasons are changing or May has a little bit of spare cash lying around after paying the bills for the month. 

On this particular Sunday, May is doing nothing but poking her head around his door ever half an hour or so, thinly veiled concern on her face. 

She asks if he needs anything. He says no. That’s not strictly true, but he doesn’t know _what_ he needs. To not exist, maybe? That sounds sort of nice. 

Instead of feeling guilty about the wasted Sunday, he just feels nothing. 

* * *

“Peter. _Dude_ , your phone.”

"Huh?" Peter responds unintelligently, glancing up to make eye contact with Ned across the table. They're sitting in the library, and he's trying his hardest to pay attention to their biology assignment that they probably should have started at least a week ago, but he doesn't think he’s doing a very good job. For starters, he’s _sure_ that Ned broached the topic of switching their topic to something else about half an hour ago, but Peter can’t have been paying attention because he can’t, for the life of him, remember what Ned suggested.

The notes that he’s been mindlessly scrawling into his notebook, copied down from the laptop screen that’s burning words into his tired eyeballs, are probably useless.

Figures. Peter can’t seem to do anything right at the moment.

When he meets Ned’s gaze, he must look confused, because Ned spells it out for him. 

“Your phone? Mister Stark has called you like, _three_ times and you’re not picking up.” 

Oh. He hadn’t even noticed.

He’s technically _meant_ to be in the tower with Ryder right now, but he’s not even entirely sure if FRIDAY will let him through the front doors of the tower, and he’s decided that he doesn’t particularly want to test that theory so he gave today a miss. 

He thought that maybe Tony wouldn’t notice, but that was stupid, in hindsight. If Peter fucks up, Tony knows about it. 

He reaches out hastily grab his phone and shove it into his backpack. Ned rolls his eyes.

“You know you can, like, answer right? I’m not gonna be annoyed, it’s not like we’re getting much done anyway.”

Ned’s voice is light, not in any way, shape or form accusing in the slightest but Peter still pulls his bottom lip between his teeth to chew on it anxiously. It’s his fault they’re not getting anything done because he keeps staring off into space.

“No, no, it’s fine. It’s not important anyway, I’ll just, um, I’ll just call him later or something. Yeah.” 

Ned looks dubious. He sets his pen down slowly. “Peter, are you sure you’re okay?”

Peter nods furiously. “Ned, I’m fine, I’m so good.” Ned looks unconvinced, and Peter continues, words rushing out hurriedly, “seriously! Just stressed and feeling a bit stupid that we left this to the last minute, that’s, like, all it is.”

“Yeah, I mean that was kinda dumb of us,” Ned concedes. “Hey, have you got all the stuff about the cell structure for the, uh,” he glances down at his own laptop screen, “bacillus bacteria?”

So that’s what they’re doing now, then. Cell structures of bacteria. 

“I'm close. Give me like ten minutes and I’ll be done,” Peter promises nervously.

He flips over a new page, discarding all of his irrelevant notes on hereditary traits. He types ‘bacillus cell structure,’ into Google and jots down as much as he can. He’s letting enough people down at the moment, he can’t let Ned down, not any more than he already has today.

They leave the library an hour later, and when they part at Peter’s subway stop, Ned gives him a hug he wraps his arms around Peter tighter than usual. It’s nice, makes him feel like he’s not in danger of falling apart at the seams for ten seconds. 

As he treks up the street to their apartment, Peter finally works up the courage to rummage through his backpack and pull out his phone. 

There are four missed calls, and then a single text sitting on the lock screen. His stomach falls. 

_You know I don’t like being sent to voicemail. Ryder let me know you stood him up this afternoon. I expect you to be there on Wednesday._

* * *

Peter forces himself back to the tower on Wednesday afternoon. 

Happy isn’t waiting outside school to pick him up, which he figures makes sense. Everyone is going to have loyalty to Tony, obviously. He’s just some dumb kid that hangs around from time to time. So, he takes the subway instead. It doesn’t even matter that he’s twelve minutes late when he steps foot in the elevator, it’s not like he has to make time to stop by and see Tony first, like usual. He just heads straight to the gym. 

When he steps into the elevator, FRIDAY jerks him out of his detached reverie.

“Good afternoon, Peter. Your heart rate appears to be elevated. Would you like me to alert Boss?”

Peter baulks at this. He can’t bother Tony, or give him any more reasons than he already has to never want to see him again.

“ _No_ , n-no thanks, FRIDAY. I’m good, just a little out of breath from the, um, from the walk from the station.” 

FRIDAY doesn’t say anything more, simply opens the lift doors for him at level sixty. 

Ryder is waiting for him in the locker room, and he can barely disguise his limp when he leaves. It's not like it matters, because there's no one here that he has to try and hide it from anymore. 

He has the whole way back to Queens, and an evening in an empty apartment, to wait for the pain to pass. 


	3. keep him safe

Peter hasn’t spoken to Tony in two weeks.

He isn’t sure what’s killing him faster, the radio silence between the two of them or the never-ending pain of Ryder tearing him apart, day after day. At this point, he doesn’t really care anymore. 

None of it matters.

Ryder's stopped even bothering with the training or hand-to-hand combat practice. Peter drags himself down to the gym day after day because he knows that’s what Mister Stark wants, that’s what he’s been told to do so he does it - but he’s not getting anything out of it apart from pain, fear and new bruises to add to the watercolour collection staining his upper arms, hips and back with dark hues. 

He’s being used constantly, his body battered. 

He hasn’t set foot in the penthouse in the same amount of time, either. Two weeks. Sixteen days, to be exact, not that Peter’s counting. He tries to force himself not to think about it, the way that he can't take the elevator up to the penthouse after his sessions and hide himself away underneath the covers of the most comfortable bed he’s ever known, or curl up in-between Tony and Pepper for a movie if they’re both taking a night off.

He doesn’t have any of that anymore. 

The last time he spoke more than a sentence to May is lost on him as well. He can't remember the last time when he didn’t wander into the kitchen in the morning, his world hazy from a lack of sleep that _isn’t_ plagued by nightmares, only to find May staring at him like she’s seen a ghost, worry seeping deep into the lines in her face. The worry is always directed towards him. He hates it.

He wishes it would stop. All of it. 

But it doesn’t. He ‘trains’ every few days, where he’s shoved up against the cool floor and violated in the most obscene way possible. 

Afterwards, he stands in the shower and watches the blood run down his legs with a kind of sick, detached fascination washing over him. It doesn’t even make him feel revolted anymore. It’s all just part of his intrinsic need to rid himself of the scratching underneath his skin, the itch of the dirty words and perverted touches and everything that is just wrong, wrong, _wrong._

He needs to _shed_ his skin, wants to burn it all off with scalding water until he’s only left with the shiny, raw pink layers underneath. Brand new. Untouched. Free of Ryder.

The showering becomes a routine, without fail. He can’t bear the thought of allowing Ryder’s touches to live on, marring his skin, for any longer than they already do. He’s uninterrupted most of the time; May’s been working later recently. Evening shifts have turned into graveyard shifts, until the point where May is creeping in at three or four am, moving as softly as she can down the hallway and skipping the creaky floorboard right outside the bathroom door, knowing how sensitive his ears are to sound. Peter thinks that she probably doesn’t want him to know exactly _how_ late she’s working, so she’s always as quiet as she can be.

Little does she know, it doesn’t matter anyway. He’s always awake. His waking moments are bad enough and having to relive them while he’s trapped inside his mind, bound by sleep, is exactly what he’s trying to desperately to avoid.

Peter's aware that the increasingly lengthy shifts are an attempt to try and save up enough to get their hot water turned back on. No matter how excruciatingly _necessary_ his routine is, it caught up to them quickly, and the thought is enough to make regret curdle so violently in his stomach that he wants to gag. 

  
  


He had returned home a week ago to find May sitting at the dining room table, a crisp white bill clutched in her hand. Her eyes were red as if she’d been crying, and that had Peter stumbling forward, reaching a shaky hand out in an aborted attempt at comfort, not quite sure how to make anything better.

She just stared at him. 

“What is this, honey? Do you know anything about this?” She waved the bill in front of his face. It blurred in front of him but he strained to focus his eyes. “I don’t understand, how can this be right?”

It was a water bill.

“We’ve run out of hot water. Peter, I - It says that our entire _month_ of hot water was used up a few days ago. That’s a few hundred _gallons_. It says that most of it was a few evenings last week, but it was between six and nine at night… I wasn’t even here. Did you leave something running? I won’t be mad, Peter, I just need to know.”

Peter had clenched his hands into fists so hard that the bitten and jagged edges of his nails bit into the skin. 

“It wasn’t-” Peter started with a lie that he hadn’t fully thought through yet perched on the tip of his tongue but as soon as he saw the desperate look in May’s eyes, he just _couldn’t_. He fell short, uselessly. “I… I just needed to shower.

“A shower with hundreds of gallons of hot water?” May asked. Her voice was still soft, she knew that something was going on, _something’s_ not right with her nephew, but she couldn’t help the incredulity written all over her face. “You know how much this costs, Peter. I don’t want you to ever worry about money but this is… this is too much. We can’t _afford_ it.”

And Peter knew this. He’s been conscious of it his whole life, the way they only buy new clothes in thrift shops or when Walmart has a sale, the way that May is always subdued the day after the bills are delivered for the month or the way that the both of them get anxious around the time that Peter has to sit the test, year after year, to re-qualify for his Midtown scholarship. He knows that money is tight, god, he knows, he really, really, does.

He just forgot. He forgets _everything_ when the need to scrub himself clean of Ryder swamps anything else in the vicinity. 

He had whispered out a quiet, “I-I, I’m so sorry, May, I didn’t mean to,” which had her stepping forward to wrap him in a hug.

She wished that Peter would let someone close enough to open up, but no matter how many times she tried over the previous weeks, he wasn’t budging. He shook in her arms like he was trying to suppress sobs.

“I’m not trying to cause trouble, I p-promise.”

“It’s okay. It’s okay, we’ll just make do.”

  
  


So now, they’re making do. 

May works double shifts that stretch way out into the night. She has to shower at work, which he knows she’s always hated doing. During the rare moments that Peter’s actually feeling anything at all, guilt joins the hopelessness. 

He starts showering in the locker rooms. He doesn’t think Tony has ever even heard of the concept of running out of hot water, so he can indulge himself without the risk guilt swallowing him whole. Sometimes Ryder joins him but he always leaves Peter discarded on the shower floor so really it’s more convenient this way, anyway. He doesn’t even have to drag himself over afterwards. Small mercies. 

The pain, the dirtiness, the vulgarity of it all is a part of him now, found a home inside of his bones. 

It doesn’t mean he doesn’t hate himself though.

Because oh _god_ , he hates himself so much. 

* * *

Tony stares down at the mounting paperwork that's accumulated on his desk since the last time he bothered to make a trip down to his office

He would really rather be spending his evening down in the lab, but he’s been struggling with new projects recently. The StarkPhone is driving him up the wall with bugs and glitches and he’s spitefully ignoring working on the Quinjet engine for SHIELD because Fury won’t stop hounding him about it, so Fury can go to hell, for all he cares.

The only thing he _really_ wants to be working on is the green energy project him and Peter have been working on for a large part of the past six months, creating microgrids in partnership with the New York Power Authority.

It seems wrong though, tinkering with it without the kid next to him, talking his ear off, excitable over things like data centre efficiency and the utility grid autonomy, things that your average teenager might not even understand, let alone _enjoy_ , but that’s one of the things Tony has always loved about Peter - nothing about him is conventional in the slightest. 

So, when even working on what he _wants_ to feels unappealing for the worst of reasons, he’s here instead. Pepper made him promise that he wouldn’t show his face in their apartment tonight until he’s read and signed at least half of the papers in front of him and he genuinely intends to get it done, something that Pepper very clearly did _not_ believe when he told her earlier.

He shakes any and all thoughts of Peter out of his mind as firmly as he can, but he’s just dragging his eyes down one of the pages to the fine print when FRIDAY speaks up.

“Boss?”

He glances up towards the ceiling, pen dangling loosely between his thumb and forefinger. “Yeah, FRI? Kinda occupied here - trying to avoid ending up on Pepper’s shit-list, mostly. Very important stuff.”

There’s a beat of silence.

And then, “I do not mean to interrupt; I just thought I should make you aware. Peter Parker entered the training gymnasium on level sixty approximately six-hours ago but he is yet to leave. I cannot obtain a read on his vitals and I believe it may be a potential cause for concern. Would you like me to deploy someone to check on Mister Parker’s status?”

Sometimes his AI is more observant than he gives her credit for, and it makes Tony’s heart clench painfully in his chest. He knows that usually, as of a few weeks ago, his AI would have directed him, himself to go and check on Peter and probably at an earlier point than _six-hours_ later. 

Tony spins the pen through his fingers slowly, and questions, “is Ryder with him?” 

They could have easily just gotten carried away, he knows all too well what Peter can be like when he’s just about got something and won’t give it up until he’s mastered it. 

“Ryder Elliot left the gymnasium five hours and eight minutes ago. My scanners detect that he is no longer in the building.” 

Tony drops his pen to the paper, and ink blots across the middle of it. He turns his full attention to FRIDAY.

“Is Peter training?”

“I told you, Boss, I cannot get a read of his vitals. Unless I am malfunctioning, it is highly likely he is in the locker room. It is my understanding that I am not installed in there.”

“Who do you think I am, FRI? Of course you’re not malfunctioning,” Tony mutters, pushing his chair away from his desk and standing up abruptly. 

There’s a part of him that honestly, wants to get FRIDAY to ask anyone else nearby to go and see if Peter’s okay. Steve was in the common room last time he checked, and he’s pretty sure Bruce is in his own lab. 

He doesn’t know if he _wants_ to see Peter. If you had asked him a week ago, his answer would have been an absolute, resounding No. If you had asked him a few days ago, you might have begun to notice some wavering around the edges of his tone.

He’s just _confused_. He’s not sure he’s ever been more confused about anything in his life. He’s been wracking his brains since that left-field accusation from Peter in the lab, to try and figure out what he possibly could have done to spur Peter to ask _that question_ , to make Peter think that lowly of him, that he’s the kind of guy that would prey on kids like the worst kind of scum. He comes up short every time. 

He doesn’t have an answer, and Tony Stark doesn’t like things with no answer, so he’s just been doing what he does best: deflecting, ignoring and repressing. If the kid has such a warped idea of him in his mind then clearly their bond could have never been as unwavering as Tony had once chalked it up to be. He pretends that doesn’t bother him.

(It does though, oh _god_ , it does. Tony hasn’t slept properly in weeks.)

He’s halfway to convincing himself that Bruce’s lab is closer to level sixty anyway, that it clearly makes much more sense to just send him down instead because he’ll be able to get there quicker, when his own protective instincts kick in. They overwhelm him and suddenly he can't do it. His deeply ingrained need to be the one who makes sure Peter’s alright, to see it with his own eyes, overrides everything else. 

So Tony goes.

The kid’s probably fine, but he needs to know, even if Peter won’t want to see him. Peter - well, Spider-Man, he guesses - is still his responsibility. He can’t have him dying under his roof or anything like that. He’ll just make sure everything is okay, he tells himself, and then he’ll leave straight afterwards.

When Tony steps out of the elevator and into the gym, it’s eerily empty. There aren’t any sparring mats or equipment pulled out to suggest that anyone’s been here at all, but he follows FRIDAY’s guidance and steps through the doors to the locker room just to make sure.

The only sound filling the space is the sound of running water. It’s warm and steamy in the room to the point of being uncomfortable. He furrows his brow. Peter has been hiding out in here for six-hours to take a _shower_?

“Hey, uh, Peter? Is that you in here?”

There’s no response. Water continues to splash against tile.

“I’m not here to chew you out or anything, just checking on you. FRI said you’ve been in here a while.”

Silence.

He wonders briefly if this is some sort of test. Whether Peter is trying Tony’s boundaries, pushing to see whether he’ll forgo Peter’s privacy while he’s so clearly in the shower.

But then, Tony has to tell himself firmly, this is _Peter_ he’s talking about. He doesn’t have a manipulative or scheming bone in his body, he’s too damn _nice_. Hell, this is the same kid that point-blank refused to help Tony and Clint stage some sort of pseudo-emergency in the middle of the tower to get back at Steve for organising a call to assemble drill at three am one morning because he was worried that Steve would take it too seriously and he didn’t want to stress anyone out.

This isn’t normal, this isn’t Peter. 

“Peter? I don’t know what’s going on but if you’re messing around then stop, I don’t want to have to come round there.”

There’s no response, again. He waits a second longer but concern bubbles within him. So, all of his worries be damned, he rounds the corner to find exactly who he’s looking for: Peter. 

Peter, who is very clearly _not_ fine. 

He’s sitting on the shower floor, directly underneath and spray and the first thing Tony notices is the angry red of his skin where the hot water is pounding down onto it. He lunges forward out of pure instinct to grab at the shower control, shoving it downwards sharply to halt the blistering stream.

“Peter, what the _fuck_? Are you trying to fucking boil yourself _alive_?”

There’s no anger in his voice. Just fear. 

Peter just continues to stare straight ahead at the wall, his eyes glazed over and unseeing. It’s as if he isn’t even aware that the water has shut off. Tony glances down hesitantly, afraid of what he might find but relieved to see that the kid is at least wearing boxers, regardless of how crumpled and haphazardly pulled up they appear to be. Then he takes his first, long and proper look at Peter in _weeks_. 

The terror Tony feels at the sight tugs his heart out of his chest and crushes it with a strong grip. 

Peter is curled into himself in a tiny ball, pressed up against the wall with his arms wrapped around his knees protectively, rocking back and forth. The dark circles under his eyes stand out against the flushed pink of his face. His lips are beginning to chap from the heat, parted slightly to make way for the ragged and uneven breaths he’s dragging in and out of his mouth.

He still hasn’t even noticed Tony.

What the _fuck_ is going on?

He can’t tell whether Peter’s just had a fall in the shower - he can be clumsy at the best of times - or whether him and Ryder practiced a little too hard today, or maybe something happened at school that’s sent him over the edge but what he _does_ know is that he hates seeing Peter so removed, so far away. He wants him back. 

Tony crouches down next to him, and it’s only when he reaches a hand out to place it on Peter’s shoulder in an attempt to get his attention that he finally does. Only, he jerks away from the hand hovering over his hot - _far, far, too hot_ \- skin, cowering further into himself.

He forces himself to stay calm.

“Hey, bud. It’s just me,” Tony says, keeping his voice as soft as he can. He knows Peter’s hearing will pick it up anyway. “Just Tony.” 

Peter’s gaze shifts slightly until he’s staring down at Tony’s shoes. It’s the first time he’s shown any sign of even being aware that he’s not alone in the room anymore. 

“M’ster St’rk?”

A tiny sigh of relief huffs from Tony’s lips.

“Yeah, yeah, Pete, that’s right. Just Mister Stark.”

“ _H’rts_.” 

“I know, I know. You’re okay, I promise. Just a little hot, but it’s nothing we can’t deal with.” 

Peter just whines in response, and even that sounds shaky. 

Tony is at a bit at a loss about what to do, but what he does know is that he wants to get Peter out of the room and into some dry clothes. 

“Will you let me help you up, buddy? I think we should get you upstairs, somewhere nice and comfy.”

“I-I can do it. Don’t wanna be a b’ther,” Peter mumbles with a sort of resigned determination on his face.

“Don’t say that,” Tony says, maybe slightly too firmly. “You’re not a bother. You could never be a…” 

Then, all the air is knocked from his lungs and he trails off the end of his last sentence uselessly. 

Because Peter is moving, reaching out blindly with his right hand to try and find some sort of purchase on the slippery tiles of the wall next to him to help himself up. His limbs are finally unfurling from where they had been curled around himself, and there are _bruises_. Dark purple blotches staining Peter’s hips and inner thighs; small angry circles like someone has dug their fingers too hard into his pale skin.

These aren’t accidental bruises, the kind that he sometimes comes back from his patrols covered in, the kind that Tony will lob a bottle of ArniCare across the room at him for and call it a day. These are glaringly purposeful. Someone is hurting the kid, _his_ kid. 

“Fuck, bud, you’re hurt,” Tony mutters desperately, leaning forward without thinking to help Peter up, to gather him into his arms, to avoid him straining himself more than he needs to. 

Then, the bad turns to worse.

Because just like the afternoon in the lab, Peter recoils from Tony’s hands coming towards him. The already unsteady breaths that he’s been sucking in hitch. 

“N-No, I can’t, I c-can’t, not again, pl-please, not again.”

_No, no, no._

_Jesus Christ._

_Fuck._

Tony doesn’t even want to think about the implication of those words. 

Something is very, _very_ wrong and it’s all his fault. It has to be. He remembers now how small Peter’s voice had been when he had asked him _the_ question.

_Mister Stark, you wouldn’t, uh, you would never, y’know, um, touch me?_

He had given way to the anxiety-driven anger burning through him in that moment. He was so afraid of the thought that Peter could potentially _fear_ him that he let it control him. 

He never checked on Peter. He let him get up and leave his lab, visibly distressed and upset. He never thought to delve further than worrying about why the boy seemed to be suddenly afraid of him, and him alone.

But that was self-absorbed and naive of him because the bruises that cover Peter tell a different story and the marks on his inner thighs don’t just _appear_ there, or end up there from sparring or a school-yard argument gone wrong. There’s a sick _fuck_ out there who did this to his kid (can he even call Peter that anymore? He’s not sure) and he’s pretty sure he knows exactly who it was.

But then again, is he any better? Because he’s the one who recommended training for Peter. He’s the one that hired Ryder, the one who left Peter all by himself in a room with that sick fuck for the first time, the one who ignored it every time Ryder told him that he just ‘needed more time’ with Peter. He’s the one who was furious with Peter, who kicked him out of the lab, and the penthouse, and his _life_ right when Peter needed him the most. 

It’s _him_ that did this to Peter.

The realisation crashes over him like the strongest of waves, knocking what little air there was left in his lungs completely out of them. Why did he think it was a good idea for him to come down here, again? Clearly, he isn’t capable of looking after Peter in the slightest. Jesus, whose idea was it to trust him with a _kid_?

He’s just as bad as Ryder. 

* * *

Tony goes through the motions for the next ten minutes, even as his whole body is screaming for him to give in to the way his whole goddamn chest feels like it's two seconds from caving in.

He holds Peter against his side but it feels _wrong_ because he shouldn’t be letting himself touch Peter. He’ll just end up hurting him one way or another. It’s inevitable, at this point. But otherwise Peter would be on the floor. He nearly went tumbling before Tony tucked him under his arm, and even now he’s limp and allowing himself to be manoeuvred without putting up a fight. 

He helps Peter into the penthouse, which is thankfully deserted, and finds him find a set of dry clothes. He settles him on the couch, tugs a blanket over him as gently as he can with his violently shaking hands.

He can’t do this. 

He needs to get the fuck out of here before he loses it. 

“I’ll go and make hot chocolate,” he gasps out, because even through the veil of panic he can tell that Peter’s blood sugar is tanking, and he’ll do anything to get him out of the room for a few minutes so he can catch his breath. 

He gets a shaky nod from Peter, who's still lost in thought and won’t even look at him. 

He makes it into the kitchen hastily, and he buckles over to clasp the stone of the island countertop as soon as it’s in reach. He hopes the coolness might ground him, but being grounded is useless when his pathetic lungs refuse to work.

He can’t get enough oxygen into his body.

There’s blood pumping through him, he can feel it as it thrums in his ears and sends his already weak heart into a fit, but the blood can’t be carrying any oxygen at all because he still can’t _breathe_.

The world spins around him.

Peter is hurt. Peter was _raped_. 

Tony yelled at him. he ignored him. He can’t do anything right. If he couldn’t help him then, why on earth would he be enough to help him now?

All he does is ruin everything he touches, hurt everyone he gets too close to. 

But holy fuck, Peter was _raped_ and he’s the one hiding himself away.

Shame rushes in to flush out some of the panic, but it still clings to his edges, his shaky breathes and trembling hands, the way his limbs tingle and protest the lack of air.

It’s as he’s trying to blink the haziness out of his unfocused eyes, he catches sight of Peter, still exactly where he left him, blanket tucked loosely around his lap. The red of his skin from the shower is fading slightly, leaving behind a white pallor in its place and Tony remembers why he’s even here in the first place.

Hot chocolate, right. 

He can do that. 

He shouldn’t be the one Peter is relying on to take care of him right now. He’s never once taken care of something without destroying it, but he’s also all that Peter’s got right now. He can’t let himself forget that. He’s not going to leave Peter alone again.

Not like last time. 

* * *

Tony only finally returns when he’s knocked enough sense into himself to know that he _has_ to do this, he _has_ to talk to Peter, his breathing has returned to a semi-stable rate and his heartbeat has calmed. Peter can hear that sort of stuff, and his quickened heartbeat would be a surefire way to freak Peter out more than he already is. When he hands Peter a mug of the best hot chocolate he could manage to pull off in his own state, he stands in front of him as he does so to ensure that Peter can see exactly where the movements around him are coming for.

Peter accepts it with hands, that Tony notes, are still trembling. He presses himself back into the corner of the sofa, an arm’s length away from where Tony sits down cautiously. Small droplets of hot chocolate slosh over the sides of the mug and hit the couch cushions every so often from Peter’s tremors. Peter doesn’t even notice and Tony decides he doesn’t care in the slightest. He’ll replace the whole damn couch, for all he cares.

Tony continues to stare at Peter, ducking his gaze away every few seconds out of fear of making the kid uncomfortable. He’s trying to form the words in his head to string a coherent sentence together, to figure out how to broach what the hell is going on, when to his complete and utter surprise, Peter beats him to it and opens his mouth for the first time since he’d found him on the floor of the locker room half an hour ago.

“I… I’m sorry.”

Tony baulks.

“Kid, what? Whatever you’re apologising for, don’t. You’ve got nothing to be sorry for, okay? If anything _I_ should be the one apologising. You hear me?”

Guilt seeps through Tony's voice, but he’s not sure Peter even does hear him. He just continues to stare down at where his fingers are laced around the mug. When he looks up at Tony again, his eyes are glistening with unshed tears.

“No, I, I’m just sorry I c-can’t do this anymore. I-I, um, I want you to kick me off the team. You can do that, r-right? Or I could probably try and speak to Captain Rogers?”

Tony’s heart drops. 

“No, no, Peter. I know I've been the absolute worst, but that’s not what we want I promise, and I don’t think it’s what you want either-”

“It i-is. It _is_. I can’t do it anymore, I can’t, I _can’t_. I won’t ever come on any missions with you guys ever again, I won’t even _ask_ , I p-promise,” Peter interrupts, begging mindlessly. He just needs Tony to understand, to free him from all this pain. “Kick me off, please, I don’t want to be on the team, I c-can’t.”

The panic inside of Tony rears its head again but this time instead of the desperate need to run, to remove himself from the situation, it has him tugging Peter against him in a hurried display of _need_ , the need to hold the kid together, holding himself together in the process. He pulls Peter close to his chest, relieved when the boy ducks closer to him and fists one hand in the bottom of Tony’s shirt instead of pulling away fearfully.

“Peter, I… I think I have an idea what’s going on, okay? But I kinda need you to tell me anyway, just so we’re on the same page here.”

“P-Please, Mister Stark, I’m sorry, I thought I-I could do it, but, I uh, I can’t, it _hurts_ , Mister Stark, it hurts so _much_.”

“What hurts? I need you to tell me, kid.” Tony hates pushing, he hates that every time he asks Peter breaks down further in tears and agony, but he needs to know. He can’t fix it if he doesn’t know. 

“My t-training, it _hurts_ , and I h-hate it.” 

Tony sucks in a breath and steels himself. He needs to know for certain. He wills himself not to freak out at the mention of this again.

“You asked if I would, uh, if I would touch you, and I… it wasn’t really me you were worried about, was it?” Tony asks and waits for a reply with bated breath, hoping he hasn’t just pushed everything too far by bringing up that incident.

Peter just shakes his head slowly. 

“Kid… Is…. Ryder’s been hurting you, hasn’t he? He's the one that's- _god_ , that's been touching you.”

It takes all of the tiny remnants of courage Peter can muster up from inside of himself to finally give a tiny nod of his head to Tony’s question, to finally fully admit to all of his pain and suffering, admit to the true reason that he feels like he’s been torn apart in a way that he’ll never fully be able to heal from.

Tony bites his lip. "And, uh, it's not just _touching_ is it? Has he gone further?" Tony asks, his insides turning queasily as the words even leave his mouth. 

Peter nods, again.

And that’s it. That’s when the dam breaks and Peter Parker finally, completely and utterly, falls apart.

The first tear falls and slips down his cheek, opening the flood gates as suddenly Peter begins to _sob_. Tony can feel the tremors wracking his small frame as he shakes in his arms, gasped breaths tugging in air around the choked cries that are getting caught in his throat. 

“I can’t do the t-trainings anymore, I just, that’s why y-you need to kick me off the team, or even I-I get it if you don’t want me _anywhere_ a-anymore, I’m pathetic and so _dirty_ and I-”

“Did Ryder tell you that?” Tony asks, fighting hard to keep the sharpness out of his voice. 

Peter just breaks their gaze and stares back down at his lap. 

“I will always want you, Pete. All of us, the whole team, will always want you. None of this is your fault. Ryder is the sick one, and I’m going to take care of it, I promise you.” 

“I really am sorry-”

“Pete, I really want to stop hearing that word coming out of your mouth. You’ve done nothing wrong, at _all_.”

“No, I mean, I’m just sorry that I, um, y’know. That I asked you that. I know I made you mad, and I didn’t mean to, I promise, and I know that you would never hurt me, I _know_ that. I just, I dunno, needed to make sure. After S-Sk... _him_ and then Ryder, I was just stupid and paranoid but I needed to know, I guess.”

Tony knows about Skip, and has known for almost a year now, ever since Peter had one of the worst panic attacks he’s ever seen the kid have in the middle of his living room after Clint had asked the two of them about whatever ‘experiments’ they were conducting down in the lab and he completely lost it.

This is twice now, that Peter has been so brutally taken advantage of. He’d give anything in the world to make the universe take all it back, to stop hurting his kid, _goddammit_.

“I get it. None of this is on you, it's all me and I owe you such a huge apology Peter, I’m the adult, and I read the situation wrong-”

“You didn’t read the situation wrong, I literally asked you if-”

“Shush,” Tony insists gently, and Peter’s mouth snaps shut hurriedly but he maintains his eye contact with Tony, doesn’t shy away. “I shouldn’t have overreacted the way I did. I… I just didn’t like the idea of you being afraid of me, I still hate it, but you were just looking out for yourself by trying to talk to me about that, kid. Sometimes that’s all we can do, try and look out for ourselves.” He pauses. “I just wish that I was looking out for you as well.”

“I’m not afraid of you. I n-never was. I know you would never hurt me,” Peter says, with the most conviction there’s been in his voice all evening. It smoothes a few of Tony’s raw nerves over gently. 

Tony doesn’t know how to reply to that, so he just pulls Peter back against him again. At the contact, Peter turns his head into Tony’s chest and cries again, his pain and suffering finally spilling out of him with heart-wrenching sobs that fill the room.

Tony just holds him. Right now, that’s all he can do.

  
  


The stay there for what feels like hours, the two of them. Peter’s tears die down eventually, slowing to the eventual hiccup or sniffle, and part of him sort of expects Tony to oust him from his arms now that he’s brought him down from the cusp of his panic, but he doesn’t.

He doesn’t force Peter to talk any more than he already has this evening, either. 

He just keeps Peter tucked up against him, his own chin is resting atop of the head of brown curls and his arms wrapped firmly around him in such a protective way that it makes Peter feel so indescribably safe and looked after that he just wants to _sleep_ but he can’t. There’s too much racing through his mind. 

Because he’s been here before. There are so many things to think about; so many things that come next.

People will want to run tests on him. He’ll have to sit in the sterile MedBay and be poked and prodded once again in places that he never wants to be touched again.

He’ll have to sit in front of a court, or SHIELD agents, and tell them everything, only for them to probably not believe him. He knows this must be the only way for the whole thing to go because that’s just what happens. He’s sat through it once before, the first time, when Skip was sent away with a slap on the wrist, too little DNA evidence to convict him. Too little DNA evidence to prove that Peter was anything other than the troubled and unstable ‘boy who cried wolf,’ that he was labelled as. 

He’ll probably be forced to therapy and have to relive the absolute worst moments of his short life so far to a complete stranger. 

He’ll have to learn how to trust again. 

He’s not sure how to do that. How to do _any_ of it.

He doesn’t really know how to articulate any of this to Tony, either, so he doesn’t. They just lie in silence together, instead. The sun sinks slowly down between the towering concrete cityscape of Manhattan out the window, the last rays of sun bathing the room in a burning orange glow. It’s nice to be able to watch the day draw to a close. Peter is more than ready for it to end.

For once, he thinks that maybe, just maybe, he might not wake up tomorrow morning with panic already encasing his chest. 

“I can hear you thinking, buddy,” Tony shushes eventually, voice soft and hands gentle as they brush through the short strands of baby hair that still curl at the nape of his neck. “It’s okay to check out for a bit, I’ve got you now.”

Peter believes him. Maybe it is okay.

So he tucks himself to Tony’s chest and lets the familiar lull of his breathing tug him down into the arms of sleep, that for the first time since Ryder, feels comforting rather than daunting. 

He trusts Tony to keep him safe. He always has. 

* * *

And Tony does. 

He works doubly hard to keep both Peter _and_ Bruce calm when they have to conduct a check-up the next morning to make sure Peter’s clean. Bruce chews him out afterwards for making him do it when he struggles to keep his cool around particularly rough cases like Peter’s, but Tony knew that Bruce was the only option if he even wanted to have a shot at convincing Peter to set foot in the MedBay.

He never leaves Peter’s side throughout the interviews and hearings that have SHIELD putting Ryder behind bars for as long as they can keep him there. 

He, himself (with the help of Steve a few days in when he realises he’ll never be able to finish it alone) tear the locker room apart and re-do it entirely - which is a stupidly gruelling and time consuming process considering that completely unsurprisingly, Peter refuses to step foot in there ever again - but it’s more for Tony’s own good than anyone else's. 

He takes over Peter’s training himself, once Peter is finally ready to put the suit on again - even despite the deep-rooted fears inside him that one day he’ll snap if given the chance and strike Peter in a way that hits too close to home with his own childhood. 

He stays in the armchair next to the bed night after night when Peter wakes up sweat-soaked and still in the throes of residual panic from a nightmare, more than willing to provide all the gentle touches he needs to help remind him that not everyone on the planet is out to cause him pain. 

He keeps Peter safe because there are lots of things in the world that Tony Stark knows how to do, but taking care of this precious kid that somehow - despite all of his past mistakes, despite the fact that he _doesn’t_ deserve him - has ended up as a permanent fixture in his life, tops the list.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i’m really happy this is all out into the world now! i hope you guys enjoyed it, and thank you for all your wonderful, ridiculously lovely comments on the last two chapters because my heart literally cannot take it. 
> 
> let me know what you thought or come say hi on [tumblr](https://searchingforstarss.tumblr.com/)!!


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